Emerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services. Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation.

No abstract

No abstract

International audiencePurpose The purpose of this paper is to assess the role of artifacts in the knowledge management field in the past 18 years (1997-2015) and to identify directions for future research. Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted a systematic literature review of 101 articles published in seven journals retrieved from EBSCO and Google Scholar online research databases. The framework for analysis included 13 codes, i.e. author(s), title, year of publication, typology, theoretical lens, categorizations, methods for empirical work, relevancy, level of analysis, keywords, findings, research themes and future research directions. Codes were analyzed using qualitative and quantitative methods. Findings The findings lacked cumulativeness and consistency in the current knowledge management debate. Empirical works outnumbered conceptual contributions by two to one, and the majority of papers focused at the organizational level of analysis. Knowledge management systems, knowledge sharing and digital archives were the major research themes connected to artifacts, together with other closely aligned concepts such as learning and online learning, knowledge transfer and knowledge creation. Research limitations/implications This study has temporal and contextual limitations related to covered time span (18 years) and journals’ subscription restrictions. Originality/value This paper is a first attempt to systematically review the role of artifacts in knowledge management research and therefore it represents a primary reference in the knowledge management field. It provides directions to future theoretical and empirical studies and suggestions to managerial practices

No abstract

No abstract

Knowledge management as a field continues to receive resounding interest from scholars. While we have made progress in many areas of knowledge management, we are yet to understand what factors contribute to employee usage of knowledge artifacts. A field study of 175 employees in a software engineering organization was conducted to understand factors that govern consumption of explicit knowledge. We assert that the decision to consume knowledge can be framed as a problem of risk evaluation. Specifically, there are two sources of risk a consumer must evaluate prior to knowledge consumption-risk from the knowledge producer and risk from the knowledge product. We find support for the factors of perceived complexity, perceived relative advantage, and perceived risk as they relate to intentions to consuming knowledge.

In today's hyper-competitive environments, generation and dissipation of knowledge can no longer be understood from within the boundaries of formal organizational mechanisms. Previously, researchers have studied knowledge management based on formal mechanisms; however, few have examined the role played by informal mechanisms. In this paper, we examine the roles of informal network players in knowledge integration and discuss their effects on competitive advantage. For researchers, our paper provides testable propositions and a future research agenda. For practitioners, our paper shows how informal network players in¯uence an organization and offers human resource management implications.